Defence Manufacturing and Procurement: Shropshire

Jeremy Quin Excerpts

Wednesday 16th December 2020 Westminster Hall

[The Minister for Defence Procurement (Jeremy Quin)]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for The Wrekin (Mark Pritchard) for calling this debate. He is an assiduous constituency MP. He is one of those people, to whom he referred, who will always advocate the cause of their constituency, but he is also one of my hon. Friends who serves on the Intelligence and Security Committee. He had a previous role with the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe and therefore knows the threats that we face, and the capabilities we need to meet those threats and deter them, both now and into the future.

It is a huge boon to my hon. Friend that he knows about the threats and capabilities, and that so many deterrents to them can be produced in the heart of Shropshire and in his constituency in particular, which combines great companies with tremendous skills, and an enthusiasm for embracing and supporting our armed forces in all their endeavours.

My hon. Friend referred to Boxer vehicles and the capabilities that they produce, which are just one good example. We look forward to bringing them into our armoury and helping to export them around the world. He touched on that, and we recognise it as a way we can help to drive forward the success of our sector in the future. We are currently the second biggest defence exporter in the world. We need to maintain that position to help ensure that we maintain research and development in our country, so that we continue to get the capabilities we need and to enhance those capabilities for the future.

My hon. Friend referred to the ventilator challenge and the work performed in his constituency. I recognise the fantastic achievements of the whole of the defence supply chain in supporting our great NHS throughout the pandemic. I highlight the work of everyone at the Defence Fulfilment Centre at Donnington in his constituency. I know that he knows it well. It has been the nerve centre and at the forefront of the logistics effort to provide vital equipment in support of the Department of Health and Social Care, including the supply of ventilators, to which he referred, and other critical medical equipment to the frontline.

The figures are astounding. Over the past seven months to November, more than 3.8 million items were handled by the defence supply chain, with the vast majority passing through Donnington. That includes over 20,000 ventilators, 70,000 pieces of equipment and over 3.7 million consumables. Those vital items have been moved and delivered across the length and breadth of the British Isles, from Belfast to Great Yarmouth, from Guernsey to NHS National Services Scotland. This has been a truly great endeavour in the face of adversity. I commend those people in defence across Shropshire, the west midlands and beyond who have risen to that vital challenge.

Donnington is just one of the valuable contributions Shropshire makes to defence. In addition to providing a central role in our pandemic response, the team at Donnington has continued, as has the rest of the defence team, to do the day job, processing 1.5 million requests, 135,000 trade receipts and 110,000 customer returns in the last 12 months for millions of items in support of our armed forces worldwide—a truly exceptional performance.

My hon. Friend referred to the broader footprint. The Royal Air Force has a significant footprint through its stations and operations at RAF Shawbury and RAF Cosford. That includes training around 200 personnel a year in basic and advanced rotary wing flying as part of the UK Military Flying Training System at Shawbury and the provision of world-class aeronautical engineering training to RAF and international students at RAF Cosford.

The school offers an extensive range of advanced apprenticeships spanning mechanical, avionics, weapons and survival equipment disciplines, from which around 2,000 aircraft engineers graduate each year. This investment in our people not only benefits defence, but sustains jobs and supports the local and wider regional economies. This is a classic example of how defence—in this case through its training school in Shropshire—provides vital skills to support our research and industrial base of the future.

More broadly, in 2018-19 we spent some £583 million in the west midlands, sustaining around 4,300 jobs, and Shropshire plays a vital role. In addition to the good work being undertaken by Kuehne+Nagel and Team Leidos at Donnington, Babcock Defence Support Group provides vital maintenance, overhaul and engineering support for our Warrior infantry fighting vehicles and other military vehicles at the Donnington site.

I would also highlight, as did my hon. Friend, the work being undertaken by Rheinmetall BAE Systems Land—RBSL—at Telford in support of the Challenger 2 life extension programme and congratulate it on the recent award of a contract of £860 million to manufacture more than 260 Boxer vehicles at its Telford facility, as part of the £2.3 billion mechanised infantry vehicle programme, to deliver a state-of-the-art capability to equip the Army’s strike brigades. It is also under contract to modernise and support the British Army’s chemical, biological, radiological and nuclear reconnaissance vehicles.

My first industrial engagement as Minister for Defence Procurement was a pre-lockdown visit to RBSL in March this year. I was very impressed by the professionalism and dedication of the workforce in delivering for defence. I was especially delighted to meet RBSL apprentices, who showed real enthusiasm for their work in supporting our defence programmes. It is vital that we continue to seek to empower future generations through science, technology, engineering and mathematics to grow a dynamic, innovative economy.

Our investment in the UK defence industry is allowing us to do just that. Within RBSL, in addition to the excellent work of the STEM ambassador scheme, the Boxer vehicle sub-contract award will allow the company to provide work and training opportunities to more than 60 apprentices over the next five years, and may also provide further opportunities throughout the supply chain. RBSL’s £20 million investment in its Telford site will not only provide state-of-the-art manufacturing facilities, but support the company’s apprenticeship schemes by delivering a high standard of training, enabling apprentices to benefit from work-based learning and paths to formal qualifications. Those schemes and other similar initiatives will help to grow and sustain engineering and manufacturing skills in Shropshire and across the UK, ensuring that we can deliver for defence now and in the future.

My hon. Friend referred to other companies, which are there in legion, be it Caterpillar or GKN, supporting us directly or through the wider supply chain doing vital work such as that on the F-35, for which we are the only tier 1 partner of our American allies. I also recognise the work of small and medium-sized enterprises, who play a vital role in the UK defence industrial base. We want to harness their ingenuity and niche capabilities in providing and supporting battle-winning capabilities for our armed forces.

In 2019, we published an SME action plan and, to support that commitment, appointed SME champions at senior level within our 19 strategic suppliers. We are targeting 25% of our procurement spend to be with SMEs by 2022. We are making progress. SMEs accounted for over 19% of the MOD’s procurement spend in 2018-19, representing some £3.9 billion, which was a significant increase on the previous year and the third year in a row in which the proportion of funds going to SMEs rose.

SMEs working in Shropshire provide valuable support to a varied range of defence activities. Air Covers Ltd is manufacturing and supplying canopy covers for the Typhoon combat aircraft fleet and Skylaunch Ltd is providing glider winches for our air cadets, among many others. Alongside our support to SMEs, we continue our internal programmes of transformation and reform, allowing us to work better with the defence industry to deliver what defence needs now and in the future. That includes leading the cross-Government review of the UK’s defence and security sectors, continued investment to manage and enhance the resilience of our supply chains, and improving the pace and agility of our acquisition processes. We are also taking the opportunity offered by our departure from the EU to develop defence and security procurement regulations tailored to better meet the UK’s needs.

We can be positive about the future, underpinned by the huge boost to defence recently announced by the Prime Minister. The four-year settlement to which my hon. Friend made reference amounts to an extra £24 billion —including at least £6.6 billion for R&D—and provides us with the opportunity to modernise and compete effectively in the digitised battlefield and, above all, deter. As one of the biggest defence spenders in the world, our investment already injects over £19 billion into our industry every year right the way across the United Kingdom, securing thousands of jobs and growing opportunities across the whole nation. The settlement will allow us to build on that and provide new opportunities across the supply chain, helping the country to build back better from the pandemic by supporting UK skills, jobs and industry.

It came as no surprise that, on the back of the Prime Minister’s excellent announcement of a multi-year spending review, my hon. Friend inquired about specific procurement exercises that I know from his previous questions are at the front of his mind and are of interest more broadly in Shropshire. On his ask for an early Christmas present, I am afraid it will come as a disappointment—but probably no surprise—that I cannot be drawn on those specific issues at this time. However, I am aware of both the capability enhancements and prosperity benefits elucidated. I am grateful to him for giving us yet another opportunity to raise them in the House, and I look forward to being able to say more in due course.

Defence is part of the fabric of the UK. Through our defence industries both big and small, the UK supports our armed forces with the equipment they need to get the job done, provide our security and keep us safe. I am convinced that the Government’s funding commitment to defence will secure the long-term future of our defence industry both in Shropshire and across all the regions and all four nations of the UK.

Question put and agreed to.